1. Field of Invention
The invention relates to a system and method supporting commerce syndication. More specifically, the invention relates to a system and method for computer based information providers to receive outsourced electronic commerce facilities in a context sensitive, transparent manner.
2. Description of Prior Art
The World Wide Web began as a simple interface to the Internet using HTML (hypertext markup language) as a means of linking documents together. This allowed a researcher, for example, to embed xe2x80x9cactivexe2x80x9d references in his or her documents that, if selected, would enable the reader to review the source of the reference first-hand. Programmers quickly capitalized on this technology, creating xe2x80x9cweb sitesxe2x80x9d which reflected less staid purposes, laying the groundwork for the literal xe2x80x9cwebxe2x80x9d of content and interactive applications that exists today. In the early stages, website programmers increased visitor traffic by placing xe2x80x9clinksxe2x80x9d within their websites to other websites, usually related in content or function, in exchange for a reciprocal link. Additionally, directories of websites, such as Yahoo, and search engines, such as WebCrawler, began to appear in an attempt to organize the content of the Internet so that its users could create xe2x80x9ccustom links pagesxe2x80x9d related to specific topics.
In these early days, the Web was mostly trafficked by programmers and xe2x80x9ctechies,xe2x80x9d and a commune-type xe2x80x9cshare and share alikexe2x80x9d mindset prevailed. As a result, people were happy to litter their sites with links, knowing that, odds were, others would do the same for them and the traffic gain/loss would probably balance out. So, despite the fact that by including and promoting a xe2x80x9clinksxe2x80x9d page, website operators were effectively encouraging people to leave their website, link sharing developed into a standard practice.
Then, entrepreneurs and other business-oriented individuals came along and introduced capitalism to the Internet. Profit-oriented website operators began to seek visitors wherever they could find them, and opportunistic owners of popular sites began to realize that they had an increasingly scarce resourcexe2x80x94visitors. Such website owners began to sell the links they had previously offered for free in the form of paid advertisements. Search engines and directories became increasingly popular for two main reasons. First, the number of websites was growing astronomically, so it was becoming harder for users to find what they wanted. Second, since reciprocal links were either going away or were being replaced by links exclusively to non-competing websites, search engines and directories were the only way to find multiple resources for a single topic.
Amid frantic efforts on the part of corporate websites to get noticed, the sale of banner ads blossomed into a large industry called Internet advertising. Thousands of websites created space for banner ads and called the space xe2x80x9cinventory.xe2x80x9d At first, they priced ads as a print ad might be priced: by CPM, or cost per thousand xe2x80x9cimpressionsxe2x80x9d each ad made on website visitors. Over time this pricing model gave way to arrangements more favorable to advertisers such as Cost Per Click-through and Cost Per Inquiry (meaning the advertiser only needs to pay when a visitor sees a banner ad and clicks on it and completes an information request form on the advertiser""s site).
Some of the most successful Internet commerce websites, led by online bookseller Amazon.com, have begun to take an even more results-driven approach to the purchase of banner ads. They have offered to pay only for ads that, when clicked, result in a product sale. To provide a stronger incentive than a simple banner ad, these companies let third-party website owners list a subset of their goods (e.g., 10 of Amazon.com""s millions of books, selected by the website owner) and promote them as they choose within their websites. Initiatives such as these have come to be described as xe2x80x9caffiliate programsxe2x80x9d, xe2x80x9cassociate programsxe2x80x9d or xe2x80x9ccommission based advertising programsxe2x80x9d.
The benefits of affiliate programs are significant. To the website owner, they constitute revenue-generating web content without requiring an investment in product inventory or additional infrastructure. They also create new revenues without necessarily reducing the website""s available ad inventory. However, the greater benefit almost always accrues not to the affiliate, but to Amazon.com and other online stores. Not only do these sites benefit from the marketing resources of the affiliate operators, they are also able to lure the visitor traffic away from the affiliate. Once a visitor clicks on an affiliate ad and enters an online store, that visitor has left the affiliate""s site and is gone. At best, affiliates are able to use xe2x80x9cframesxe2x80x9d to keep a shell of their own website around the vendor""s site, but this is only a marginally effective solution. No alternatives have been able to address a fundamental drawback of the affiliate programsxe2x80x94the loss of the visitor to the vendor. At best, some Internet affiliate sales vendors have begun placing xe2x80x9creturn to referring websitexe2x80x9d links on their order confirmation screens, an approach that is largely ineffective. This limitation of an affiliate program restricts participation to less trafficked websites that are unconcerned about losing visitors. Meanwhile, search engines and directories continue to increase in their usefulness and popularity, while banner ads and old-style links continue their rapid loss of effectiveness and popular usage.
The present invention overcomes these limitation of present affiliate commerce systems and provides other benefits as will become clearer to those skilled in the art from the foregoing description.
The affiliate commerce system and method of the present invention represents a new paradigm of co-marketing on the Internet. Not only does the present invention provide its Hosts with the added value and incremental revenues of traditional affiliate programs, but the company also enables Hosts to control the customer experience before, during, and after the purchase transaction. At the same time, Merchants receive the same benefits as with older affiliate programs, i.e., increased marketing potential, incremental sales, and new customer relationships, but without the restrictive limitations of affiliate programsxe2x80x94the loss of hard-won visitor traffic.
Additionally, the present invention can actually obviate the need for some merchants to invest in their own unique Internet presence. By using the present invention as their primary online sales channel, these Merchants can focus on product development, production, and order fulfillment and leave the exploration of the Internet to experts. The resulting ongoing cost savings and operational efficiencies magnify the potential benefits of the Internet while reducing the initial costs.
According to the present invention the look and feel of each participating Host is captured and stored. Hosts may include links to selected products or product categories within pages residing on the Hosts"" website. Upon actuation of such a link by a visitor of the Host website, a page is presented to the visitor incorporating a replica of the Host""s look and feel directed to the sale of the selected products or product categories.
The look and feel of a host is captured and stored by receiving an identification of an example page of a target host. The identified page is retrieved. The look and feel elements of the page are identified, and these elements are stored for future use in generating outsourced transparent pages, pages served by a server other than the host but with the host""s look and feel. Such pages give the viewer of the page the impression that she is viewing pages served by the host.
The links included by the host directed to the outsource provider need not be statically linked to a particular product or product category. Such links may direct the outsource provider to dynamically select content to serve within the host""s look and feel. This content may be selected based upon a contextual analysis of the page which includes the link. Further, the dynamic content need not be limited to products or product categories but may include any content within the system""s data store that is amenable to contextual correlation with content in the page containing the link.
A cost effective, scalable architecture may be used to serve dynamically constructed pages such as those served by the e-commerce outsource provider. This architecture includes three levels: a Web server layer, an application server layer and a database server layer.
The Web server layer provides a front end presentation layer for interacting with end users. This layer may consist of one or more interchangeable low cost server systems. Any request from an end user may be fielded by any system within the layer. The selected system can contact any application server within the application layer to provide processed data for use in responding to the end user request.
The application layer supports interacting with the database server level to acquire needed data and processing it prior to presentation by the Web server layer. As with the Web server layer, this layer may consist of one or more interchangeable low cost server systems. Any Web server system may submit a request to any application server. The application server includes processing functionality suitable for the types of pages to be dynamically constructed.
The database server layer supports low level management of data used in dynamic page construction. The data store across the one or more low cost server systems is seamlessly viewed as an integrated whole. As a consequence, any database server within the layer can field any request for data submitted by an application server.